Two-member HRD team to submit report

Human Resource Development (HRD) Minister Smriti Irani on Monday dispatched a two-member team to the University of Hyderabad to investigate the suicide case of a Dalit research scholar in the campus even as the incident sparked furore across the country.

The minister, however, refused to comment on Union Minister Bandaru Dattatreya’s letter to her in which he complained about the varsity becoming “den of anti-national activity”, seeking her intervention.

She also refrained from making any comment on the suspension of five Dalit students by the vice-chancellor as both Dattatrya and Appa Rao along with two others were booked by the police for abetting Rohith Vemula’s suicide.

“In a time of grief like this, I express my condolences to the family who lost their son,” she told a news agency.

“We have sent a two-member team from the ministry who will apprise us of the situation in the university. Everyone knows that in central universities, the administrative control belongs only to the varsity. The government has no role to play,” she added.

While over 500 students of Delhi University and Jawaharlal Nehru University staged an protest outside the Shastri Bhavan, which Houses HRD Ministry, blaming Irani for Vemula’s suicide, students protest were held at universities and college campuses including IIT-Bombay to express their solidarity with University of Hyderabad’s agitating students.

“Shame on you, Smriti Irani and Down with Hindu fascism. Down with Smriti Irani,” the students shouted outside Shashtri Bhavan. As the agitating students refused to leave, police used water canons to disperse them. These students were agitating under the banner of Krantikari Yuva Sangthan (KYS).